- Pressing the accelerator as hard as I’ve been used to doing in Daytona, including the time I kicked Alec’s ass, produces an alarmingly loud vrrrrOOOOOOOOMMM.
- The rear-view mirror is just big enough to notice my bad hair day in, but not big enough to fix it in.
- I seem to have gone all these 23 years without noticing my short, weak left leg.
- While walking through the circuit ground in order to get to the service counter of the driving school, do not take any known rules of traffic for granted. I was reminded today, while concentrating more intently on mastering turns than not mowing pedestrians down, of my realization when I learnt skiing that I wouldn’t want to be downslope from me. At least they put an extra brake pedal on the instructor’s side of the car.
- Note to self: When rollin’ along in my 5 point o, with my ragtop down so my hair can blow, releasing the clutch too abruptly will produce the required jerky car-bouncy effect. Good to remember.
Archive for January, 2004
I haven’t been this endeared since Weezer’s Gone Fishing video. If the Peanuts gang dancing to Hey Ya doesn’t put a smile on your face, you have a heart of stone and a bum of lead.
(Link found at largehearted boy)
I attended two events at Wordfeast last week, in an attempt to haul myself back onto the poetry wagon. One was a poetry slam competition, and the other was a conventional reading.
I wish I could enthuse about how they rekindled my poetic mojo, and how I will be bounding up to mics in the future to spreadeagle my words for the world, but I unfortunately find myself in the bollockless position of having mixed reactions to it all.
My first problem is that I was quite often very bored. Look, I know this probably crosses some poetry-writers’ solidarity line in the sand, but a lot of poetry can just be boring when read out loud, even if it works well enough on the page. This is especially so when the poem is long and the voice is monotonous. I don’t care if it’s recognized some day as the Paradise Lost of 2003, I’m still going to have to say my first experience with it was far from edifying.
My second is that I was quite often very frustrated. A lot of poems that sounded like I could have enjoyed them were so badly delivered by their authors as to render them a waste of breath. I know it can’t be helped that not all good poets are good performers. And I’m not insisting the whisperers, mumblers, droners and mic-dummies of this world be barred from reading their own poetry out loud. I’m just pointing out that with some practice in the relevant skills, or alternatively roping in a competent friend to do it for you, the jump in appreciation for the listener can be so significant as to make it well worth considering if you want your presence there to be even worthwhile. The most transcendental experience I have ever had with a poetry reading was in the shabby basement of my hall of residence in London, where my hallmate James read Seamus Heaney’s Death Of A Naturalist so evocatively that for a moment I almost truly believed myself to be surrounded by vengeful frogs.
My third problem is that in response to the now-obvious heckle of “Well why don’t you go on up and show everyone how to do it properly then, smartass?” I must admit that although I think I’m all right at reading poems out loud, I think my own stuff is decidedly mediocre. So I’m not quite ready to assume the mantle of Poetry Reading Saviour of Singapore either.
My fourth problem is that every time I get bored, I am consumed by the urge to go up there and recite Ice Ice Baby with great feeling. I held back at Wordfeast because I felt it would be fairly rude to consciously lower the tone of the event, and also because it might be seen as poking fun at some of the less successful attempts at rhyming poems. But some day I fear it will overcome me.
I have a bad feeling about this. The last time a song was in my head so continuously, I ended up walking down the street not realizing I was singing Wave Of Mutilation out loud.
I really don’t want to burst out into a rousing chorus of “Fuck you you ho, I don’t want you back” in the middle of Chinese New Year family visits.
I am full.
More precisely, I am full of:
Peking duck
Suckling pig
Baby octopus
Jellyfish
Salmon sashimi (multiple servings)
California maki
Eel maki
“Monk jumps over the wall” soup
Scallops in spicy X.O. sauce
Coffee pork ribs
Deep fried marble goby fish
Steamed tilapia Thai style
Black pepper ostrich
Braised beancurd with mushrooms and spinach
Braised spicy eggplant with minced pork
E-fu noodles
Herbal jelly with honey
Almond jelly with longan
Ice cream puffs (multiple servings)
And all for less than £15 per person. I heart a la carte buffets.
People in Europe, eat your hearts out. Oh wait, it’s too expensive. Ha ha.
[Forgive the gloating at the end. It’s just part of my attempt to fend off a recent attack of Londonsickness (which still feels synonymous with “homesickness”) by reminding myself of the good things about being here.]
The two books I’m reading at the moment are 100 Years of Solitude (re-reading) and Life And Times Of Michael K.
In 100 Years Of Solitude, a plaster statue of St Joseph left by an unknown visitor at the Buendia house is found to be full of gold coins. For years after that, Ursula, the matriarch of the family, insists on asking every visitor to the house whether they once left a plaster statue of St Joseph there. She has hidden the coins to keep them safe for their owner, and steadfastly refuses to reveal where they are to anyone else.
13 pages into Life And Times Of Michael K, a plaster statue of St Joseph has been stolen from a charitable mission building, now devastated by an outbreak of looting and disorder.
Tamara posted the following comment in response to this entry at Little Yellow Different:
“Something similar happened when I went back to Singapore and tried to ask for “more chilli” in Chinese [after not speaking any in 2 years]. The mandrin is “lah jiao”, but I came up with “lan jiao”, Hokkien for dick, thereby begging the nice hawker stall lady for more dick. Nice.”
Bursting out in laughter in a quiet law library is rather embarrassing, as is walking down the hill to the bus stop later unable to keep one side of your mouth or the other from quirking upwards as you try to keep the broad grin off your face. In the first situation you either appear inconsiderate and attention-seeking, or just the weird person with no inner monologue who everyone else avoids unless they are unfortunately assigned to the same project group. In the second situation you either look lecherous, tic-laden or capable of inspiring New Paper (a Singapore tabloid) articles on Elvis living in Kent Ridge.
Note to self: remind Alec when he comes to Singapore that if he ever wants to order steamed chicken rice rather than roast, the correct term is “bai ji” (white chicken). Getting the words mixed up and asking for “ji bai” with an ang mor accent has great potential for disaster.
So anyway, thanks for that, Tamara. I’ll think of you the next time I feel tempted to appear like a total nutcase to the public at large.
I don’t usually bother with memes, but this one about choosing your favourite musicians from A to Z (from largehearted boy and previous sources) is fun, if agonizing. The distribution of great bands across letters of the alphabet is so cruelly uneven!
A: And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead
B: Beck
c: Calla
D: Bob Dylan
E: Missy Elliott
F: Fugazi
G: Grandaddy
H: David Holmes
I: Interpol
J: Michael Jackson
K: Knifehandchop
L: Low
M: Mogwai
N: Neutral Milk Hotel
O: Outkast
P: Pixies
Q: Queen
R: Radiohead
S: Sonic Youth
T: Amon Tobin
U: U2
V: Velvet Underground
W: Wilco
X: Xiu Xiu
Y: Yo La Tengo
Z: Zwan
The list of honourable mentions which only narrowly lost out to these is so long I gave up typing it halfway.
It begins again, but surprisingly, I don’t feel the need to say “too soon”.
I still emerge from the torturous number 10 bus to/from NUS feeling like Rip Van Winkle. I still wander around campus feeling translucent and disconnected, as if hoping my real university will come one day to rescue me and take me home.
But none of it is feeling as bad as it did. My Tuesday evening class in Corporate Finance Law actually looks like it will be interesting. Admittedly, during this morning’s excruciatingly boring Evidence lecture I was attached to consciousness only by an increasingly brittle thread, and view my even earlier starts on Thursday and Friday with justifiable trepidation, but even here I am trying to Make The Best Of Things and am hoping this might force my body clock into something less like a prostitute’s.
I’ve found out I got a better grade in last semester’s moot course than about half the people who got into the teams I viewed as more prestigious. This challenges the assumptions underlying a lot of my previous angst about letting myself down through bad performance.
Ming + FS’s Hell’s Kitchen sounds awesome from my new speakers. That has absolutely nothing to do with university but let’s be holistic here.
Most importantly, I’m finally coming round to the view that it has all been, and will be, for the best.
In hindsight, there is almost nothing I would be willing to exchange for the 16 days I could devote to being with Alec when he was here - a freedom that would simply not have been possible if I’d got on the moot team I originally wanted. Distance is still a bitch, but over the next few months it will hopefully become our bitch now that Alec’s going to get broadband.
For the first time in years, I’ve bothered with New Year’s resolutions. Going lindy-hopping again, improving my bowling score, learning to drive, keeping in touch with friends, drinking equal amounts of pure water for all other drinks I have, and taking positive steps to combat my eczema seem realistic enough, and will all make me much happier in Singapore if acted upon.
In the meantime, there are Chinese karaoke songs to perfect, (apparently) a dirt cheap bar in Suntec City to enjoy with Terry and other like-minded lushes, a poetry festival in the offing, rare Múm mp3s available for download on their site, and a beloved boyfriend to call, right now, in fact. Peace out.
Earlier tonight, while watching Justin Timberlake: Down Home In Memphis on Starworld:
My mum: So who’s this?
Me: blah blah blah blah soooooo cute blah blah blah blah sooooo catchy blah blah blah blah fantastic dancer, look mum!
My mum: He looks like Gurmit Singh.
I have not the words.
[For non-Singaporeans: Gurmit Singh is a local TV personality, best known for an admittedly masterly comedy role as a dodgy building contractor sporting a mini-Afro perm, yellow rubber boots, and a large mole, best forgotten for an attempt at a talk show where he was probably trying to be Conan O’Brien but didn’t quite realize that only Conan O’Brien can be Conan O’Brien, and everyone else trying to be Conan O’Brien really just ends up as cringeworthy as Brooke Shields in Suddenly Susan. Suffice to say, he SO DOES NOT EVEN FAINTLY RESEMBLE JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE, OR VICE VERSA.]
